It would not be a good trade off, at least in my opinion. Keep in mind that on a typical 848 head for example, if you run your finger down the far corner of the exhaust chamber, you will feel a little bump. Exhaust flow stalls right there, about .300 lift, and then picks up a bit after that. So to build a little extra power (a relative term with our dinosaur motors, lol), you need a little of both, some additional duration, and a bit higher lift. So the Oregon cam is in the right neighborhood duration wise for a mild improvement with a smooth idle, but the motor can stand some extra lift. The Schneider specs are just about where I would want them for a mild smooth idle cam, and are pretty much the same as the entry level cam that jack Clifford sold for years (his was 256 duration and I think .420 or .430 lift i forget offhand). If its any help, the cam in my 261 is 280 duration and .492 lift and I drive it all over on the street. But it has a very loopy cam and is probably my upper end for a street cam. So with a cam some 24 degrees less in duration and .60 less in lift then the Schneider, more in the case of the Oregon, you can see that cams in the 253-256 duration range and .410-.430 lift range are pretty mild comparatively speaking. So I would want just a bit more lift.
That being said, Oregon has been in business since he 80s, and you don't stay in that biz very long if your product stinks. Schneider has been in the biz since the 50s, same thing. I like Schneider cams because they treat me well, don't make me feel like they are dong me a favor grinding me a cam for my old motors, and frankly, the cam broke in perfectly and runs great. So I am sort of hesitant to change from a known quantity. That being said, I sent an email to Oregon requesting a list of their cam grinds for the 235/261 chevy because I am always looking for resources for these motors, I did receive a response, a list of all of their available grinds, for all motors it looks like, so I cant really say much about what they recommend or offer specifically for a 235/261.
Last edited by Dragsix; 01/31/2019 7:39 PM.
